Private Public House; JAGUARS AND TRIUMPHS JUST LOOK BETTER PARKED IN FRONT OF A PUB.

Byline: PHIL BERG

"We all said, `Wouldn't it be nice to have a pub?''' Ian Furness says as he recalls the time several years ago when he was on a break from picking through the giant AutoJumble swap meet outside London. He was with friends Jerry Gray and David Pritchard, searching for vintage Jaguar pieces.

They were in a dingy, dank pub after hunting down roof clamps, moldings and fasteners for their Jaguar E-types back in the States. "Next thing I know, Jerry's going to places in England where they tear down old buildings, and he has a pub shipped back in a container to put up in his garage, which is underneath his house,'' says Furness.

So Furness copied the idea. "The wood is from a library in England that was being torn down, and the doors are from a bank. The bar is made from English oak planks and came from an old chicken coop,'' he explains. The Theakston Queens Arms sign, however, came not from England but from the U.S. parts mecca of Hershey, Pennsyl-vania. The 40-foot beams were found locally after a barn teardown, and they are structural, holding up the ceiling of the reconstructed 1000-square-foot pub inside the 8000-square-foot garage he built five years ago to hold his 23 Jaguars, Astons, Minis and MGs. The exterior of the pub is lined with 17 British bikes, from a Brough Superior to a Vincent Black Lightning, plus a complete collection of Royal Family commemorative Triumphs. "I've gradually been getting moreI'm a junkie,'' he admits.

"When I finished the garage, I had to get an inspection,'' Furness says in his perfect Midwest accent but with droll English humor. "They thought it was nuts.''

Furness' parents and most of his family are from the United Kingdom, although he was born and grew up a Yank and has lived in the same ...